Caterpillar is another one. I think it was the last reporting period of last year that CAT said they had no profits from US operations for three straight quarters but had huge gains in most overseas markets.

They went on to say that if the trend continued they may have to consider moving a large portion of their operation to over over seas locations to be closer to what is becoming their core business. The said to continue to pay taxes on repatriated earnings did not make sense.

Kerry Tobin wrote:People will care, the ones paying for it will. They'll also care when in the not-to-distant future we simply can't afford to pay for any of it anymore.

Heck, even Microsoft is now stating if some of the proposed tax raises go through they are simply going to ship thousands of jobs out of the country. Many of the recent changes and proposals will also wipe out small businesses.

I already paid, in fact 50% of my retirement savings under Bush's version of unregulated CAPITALISM.

The jobs Microsoft is talking about will go overseas regardless. Those are the same sort of threats the auto makers used to make up to about 30 years back. I remember Bob Kasten who preceeded Feingold telling me how he could not support better mileage standards because automakers would leave the US. The auto makers scared him and got their way AND left the US.

So to make up for the loss in savings we should bankrupt everyone's grandchildren?

Even now "we" aren't paying for the new proposals, China is simply loaning us the money. Anything new added will simply put the next generation even further behind...

I have no dreams the Social Security program that current retirees firmly believe they are entitled to (whether they need them or not) because they already paid their dues and paid in will ever pay me a dime.

That is such a typical liberal response. You lost 50% of your retirement because you made bad investment decisions but you blame it on Bush.

The market collapse was the results of the failed policies of the past administrations both Democrats and Republicans. It was distended from the beginning of the high risk loans that were encouraged to make home ownership more wide spread.

But now you want to what, turn to socialism so maybe you can get a piece of someone else's retirement that they were smart of enough not to lose?

It's not only the manufacturing jobs and factories going over seas but clerical and office staffs. It used to be and in most cases as of now, the Lawyer Firm of Crook and Crook had "in house" paralegals being paid at least Fifteen bucks an hour. Now Crook and Crook realized it is much more cost efficient to send a library of law books overseas to a paralegal over there at Fifteen bucks a day. They phone and fax and e-mail to each other and job is done. Crooks and Crooks don't have to pay US wages and don't need to pay benefits, health insurance, unemployment tax etc. and don't need to have an employee Christmas party either. Welcome to the Brave New World.

I have a friend of mine that owns a company that is based in India and he lives here in town. He has zero employees locally.

He has a contract with a number of fast food restaurants in Phoenix and Los Angels and a huge telephone fulfillment center in India where they answer the phone when you drive into the drive thru window at one of these fast food restaurants. You hit the button and some one in India is the one saying, "Hi, welcome to Jack In The Box, can I take your order?"

They take the order and it is punched into a computer that sends the order via the Internet to a screen that pops up in the kitchen and processed just like a regular order and one of front counter people merely hands it to you out the drive up window.

The system replaces three workers a day in a 24-hour drive through restaurant. And all of the associated costs of that employee such as training, health care, workmen's comp, showing up late or not at all, calling in sick, etc, etc.

My friend is making a fortune. He is growing in leaps and bounds. He also has a system where you walk into a sit-down restaurant and at every table there is an input system where you enter your own order and when it is done they call your name and you go up to the pick-up window and get it yourself. No waiters or waitresses, just bus boys wiping down tables when you leave.

Kerry Tobin wrote:I really don't think the Bush argument will hold up much longer. You're already beginning to see it as Obama's economy (it became his when he bought the auto industry, banking industry, etc.

One of the night show hosts recently joked that Obama was declared auto executive of the year by Car & Driver...

Just a little clarification, here -----

The auto company bailout and the bailout of the financial institutions were both done by the Bush administration, prior to the January innauguration of Obama.

The financial stimulus package, and the "Cash for Clunkers" program were accompllished subsequent to the innauguration.